We went to the farm. Again.

Wow... September already. Where does the time go?!

To be honest, September kind of started out a little weird for me. The 1st was my Dad's birthday and every year when it rolls around I tend to think about the what ifs and should have beens a little more than I do on any other given day. We should have been celebrating his 59th birthday that day. I wonder what we would have done... gone out to eat? To a baseball game? Family dinner at home? But instead I was left to realize that while we should be celebrating his last year in his 50's, in reality he never made it to them. It's another one of those little reminders that he's not here and, well, it sucks.

I'm not usually one to wallow in self-pity and sadness, but the whole week was just kind of off. Not due to any one big thing that I could pinpoint, I guess just a bunch of little things that all started adding up. However, I'm a firm believer in the Fake It Til You Make It strategy -- looking for the good (because there's lots to find), talking about the good, taking pictures of the good, writing about the good -- basically, just totally immersing myself in all the beauty of life until I'm no longer faking it. It usually works out pretty well.

And the show must go on and while nothing extraordinary has taken place, it's still been good: we volunteered at Ironman last Sunday. Went out to eat and to the Improv with some friends for a birthday celebration. On Saturday Josh took me on a date night... we went to see Switch then out to dinner at Texas Roadhouse. Sprinkle in some half marathon training runs and some classes/homework and that pretty much covers last week.

The long weekend was a welcomed break and we spent Sunday afternoon at the farm. It was definitely much-needed.

Upon our arrival, Josh's parents told us about a snake his dad had shot from across the lake. We could see it, still hanging on the fence and moving, through the telescope.

So like a good little Boy Scout, Josh decided we needed to go over there and check it out.

I'm not a fan of snakes and if it hadn't already been shot twice and was moving at a normal speed, I probably would have been jumping up & down and screaming like a little girl.

Apparently two bullet wounds are enough to slow down a snake, but not kill it.

Josh finished him off and was strangely proud of it...

*shudders*

I hate killing things... even things I don't like, like bugs, spiders, and snakes. But apparently you have to kill the snakes because they like to eat the ducks and geese and other good wildlife around the farm.

Moving on....

It was such a beautiful day. The weather was absolutely perfect.

After a few walks around the lake, some 4 wheeling, playing fetch with three eager doggies, grilling hot dogs and eating toasted apple butter sandwiches, Josh's mom showed me her new (pink!) shooting bow.

And even though she described it as difficult and said I probably couldn't shoot it because I may break it, she made it look so easy! So when it was my turn (which I only agreed to take because Doug assured me that I wouldn't break it as long as I listened carefully), I was half excited, half scared to death that I was going to break it especially since I'd never shot one before in my whole life.

And Josh's mom totally called me out and said she didn't think I could pull it back by myself. It looked so easy and I was all Psshh, whatever. I've been doing group power classes, I can totally do that.

But she was right.

Doug had to help me every time.

And my shoulder is still sore today. But other than that, I actually thought shooting was fun! And apparently I'm decent at it because I shot each arrow within 3 inches of each other. Even though I only shot it twice. But at least I didn't break it! Lynda probably wouldn't be my best friend anymore if I broke her bow. :(

Then Josh did a little shooting with some infrared filters and I thought they turned out pretty cool.

And I learned that infrared light is invisible to the human eye... so my question is this, how do we know about infrared light if no one can actually see it? hmmm...

After a wonderful afternoon at the lake it was time for us to head home because we had an ice cream date (which is really my favorite kind of date) with some friends.

I love love love Josh's parents... maybe because they love love love each other and they're so cute! And I'm so happy that we both have parents that we actually like hanging out with! :-D Thanks for inviting us up for another day at the farm.. we had a great time (and so did the boys!)!!